"Free speech" as understood at the end of the 18th C. was also radically different from the modern age of personal printers, email, the internet, television, etc. But that's completely beside the point. I didn't write the constitution, nor am I tasked with interpreting it.

My point is that unless (until?) someone has committed a crime, we have no grounds for denying them any of their civil or constitutional rights as they currently exist, and that's the way it should be.

Unfortunately, we cannot accurately predict who is going to abuse those rights. Most Nazi skinheads do not ever go on shooting rampages, and many seemingly "normal" people who do not espouse violent rhetoric or give prior warning then do.

We don't get to decide, based on their thoughts and opinions (and ours), who qualifies for rights and who does not. To suggest otherwise is insane and a recipe for disaster.

Question A: There is no basis to deny 2nd Amendment rights to people whose speech is covered by the 1st Amendment. That is to say, "I do not agree with your worldview and find the things you say disgusting" are not justifiable grounds for denying someone the right to purchase a weapon, or to speak their mind freely. Criminal and psychiatric history? Sure. Unpleasant opinions and speech? No. Once you start denying people their constitutional rights based on their thoughts, opinions and speech, it's a very slippery slope that none of us should ever want to start going down.

Question B: Because she's an American right wing loser. Once again, a very easy question to answer.

Question C: If they were rational, consistent people, then yes, of course they would be ashamed.

I'm aware of the situation in Switzerland. The source I used specified the rates were of private firearm ownership--I assumed it was aside from the government-owned rifles.

Military firearms aside, the Swiss are a high firearm ownership society. They have a strong gun culture and target shooting is their national sport.

It's not "muddying the waters," even if we include the fact that most Swiss households have a fully automatic rifle--a true "assault rifle" aka machine gun--it only bolsters my point: that widespread availability of firearms itself is not what drives crime rates and homicide rates (firearm or otherwise).

P.S. Sorry for the mishmash of trend tags at the beginning of the first attempt to post this comment-- I was posting a pic to Instagram and accidentally combined the trend tags with the comment.

I'm aware of the situation in Switzerland. The source I used specified the rates were of private firearm ownership--I assumed it was aside from the government-owned rifles.

Military firearms aside, the Swiss are a high firearm ownership society. They have a strong gun culture and target shooting is their national sport.

It's not "muddying the waters," even if we include the fact that most Swiss households have a fully automatic rifle--a true "assault rifle" aka machine gun--it only bolsters my point: that widespread availability of firearms itself is not what drives crime rates and homicide rates (firearm or otherwise).

Yes, that number is obviously not a percentage of households--it is what I said it was, the number of private firearms owned per 100 people. It's an entirely normal and acceptable way to discern the "rate" of something--divide the total by the population. That's how we figure out murder rates and firearm homicide rates as well. Why are you acting as if you've uncovered some nefarious subterfuge?

No, that's actually my point—that homicide rates have far more complex causes than firearm availability, and that merely putting the UK and the US side by side and saying "The UK has no guns and no homicides and the US has lots of guns and lots of homicides" is grossly oversimplifying the matter.

The UK has always had much lower homicide rates than the US, even long before they instituted their gun control measures.

Comparing different countries is generally not of much use, as the varying cultures and economic conditions—along with a host of other factors—have a much greater effect on crime and homicide rates. That's why Japanese Americans—full firearm availability—have crime rates as low as Japanese in Japan. It's their culture, not whether or not they can get guns.

The rate of private gun ownership per 100 people
United States 88.82
United Kingdom is 6.72
Canada 23.8
Switzerland 45.7
Mexico is 15.02

The annual rate of homicide by any means per 100,000 population
United States 4.96
United Kingdom 1.2
Canada 1.8
Switzerland 0.70
Mexico 21.5

The annual rate of firearm homicide per 100,000 population
United States 2.98
United Kingdom 0.03
Canada 0.50
Switzerland 0.52
Mexico 10.0

If homicide rates (and more specifically, firearm homicide rates) correlated with firearm ownership rates, then Mexico's firearm homicide rate should only be about twice that of the UK's, not 10 times higher. And Switzerland's firearm homicide rate should significantly higher than it is, with their high rates of firearm ownership, and their overall homicide rate certainly shouldn't be lower than the UK's.

When you compare a wider selection of countries--rather than just the US and the UK--you find that there is very little correlation between firearm ownership and homicide rates. The numbers are all over the place. It's almost as if crime and homicide rates have far more complex causes than simply firearm availability ...

There's been something nagging in the back of my mind, and I just realized what it is.

This shooting shares an eerie similarity with a movie I watched (I use the term loosely, I fast forwarded through most of it) on Netflix last year, about a 20-something young man who plans a mass shooting in his small town.

In a departure from most mass shootings, where the perpetrator kills himself before being apprehended, the shooter in the movie returns to his car and drives away. I believe the Aurora shooter was apprehended in his car?

The shooter in the movie outfits himself in body armor--including legs--and a black armored helmet. Look familiar? link to covershut.com

"you folks against gun control have had your way on this issue and it's not working."

You're right--in the last 20 years, almost every state in the country has allowed concealed carry, with over 6 million permits issued. The assault weapons ban expired 8 years ago, and gun sales are at an all time high.

And our violent crime rates and homicide rates are at the lowest they've been in 40 years: link to nytimes.com ... And that's even despite our recession.

What is your definition of "not working"?

So let's say your proposal was in effect, and the Aurora shooter had registered his firearms locally and nationally. How exactly would that have prevented him from going ahead with his plan?

Canada implemented a national registry in 1995, including long arms. And the result?

They just scrapped it this year, because all it did was cost millions of dollars and did not "minimize risks to public safety with evidence-based outcomes such as reduced deaths, injuries and threats from firearms," and the former Police Commissioner for Toronto said in 2003 that the "law registering firearms has neither deterred these crimes nor helped us solve any of them."

I am a liberal who has been reading your blog daily since at least 2004, and have approvingly linked to you dozens of times on my own blog (when I wrote it) and can prove this to you if you require it. On almost every other issue, I agree with you and think you're magnificent. It just so happens that on this issue, I diverge with you, so on this topic I comment (I'm not one for commenting on posts I agree with).

You cannot alter AR-15 to not accept JUST 100rd drum magazines, because the top of a 10, 30 or 100rd magazine are all identical—it's the body of the magazine that differs. In theory, any firearm that accepts an external magazine could accept a 100rd magazine if someone manufactured one for it. If 100rd magazines are the issue, then go ahead and advocate that we ban 100rd drums. It's much more realistic technically and politically.

The Assault Weapons Ban did not ban AR-15 rifles. They were freely and readily available throughout it's duration.

"You don’t hunt deer with them."

They have been used as varmint and ranch rifles for decades, but they have not been used for hunting deer because the cartridges they used were not powerful enough. But in recent years, the AR platform has been made in a variety of larger calibers and are increasingly being used for hunting; it's not at all uncommon. These are not automatic weapons--an AR-15 chambered in .308 for deer hunting is not more deadly or dangerous than a more traditional .308 rifle. It's just lighter and more durable.

"They have no legitimate civilian use."

They are the primary rifle platform used for target shooting and other shooting sports, and millions of civilians own them and are not murdering people with them. They are not machine guns, they have the same legitimate civilian uses as any other rifle.

"The issue isn’t banning guns, it is banning murder weapons. The assault weapons ban was implemented by Clinton and in place for years and could easily be put back in."

Yet in this comment you've just correctly noted that the majority of firearm homicides are committed with handguns, not "assault weapons." If your goal is to ban "murder weapons," then you'd move to ban handguns. "Assault weapons" are hardly ever used in crimes (only about 3% of homicides are committed with rifles of any sort).

Of course, no matter which you decide are "murder weapons," banning an entire class of firearms is, in fact, "banning guns," so I'm not sure why you're saying you don't want to an guns. It's clear that you do.

That being said, the Assault Weapons Ban you want reinstated did not remove a single "assault weapon" from private ownership, nor did it prevent XTRA DEADLY firearms from being manufactured. It prohibited a firearm from having two or more largely cosmetic features (bayonet lug, pistol grip, etc) which did not effect the speed or accuracy of the bullets that were fired from the gun. Gun makers merely removed those features or created new models that did not have them.

A .223 rifle with a traditional wooden stock is not less dangerous than a .223 rifle with a synthetic pistol grip.

I have no doubt that the arms used by the militia back then were primarily used for hunting more than anything else. But that's beside the point—the 2nd Amendment says nothing about hunting whatsoever, so the common complaint that this gun or that gun "can't be used for hunting" as an argument for restricting or banning them is totally irrelevant. That's all I am saying.